Gen Z wants more available free time

Your lifespan has a limit and with no amount of money you can buy new time. Generation Z is becoming more and more aware of this, and as a result, time is becoming an increasingly important exchange or means of payment. Gen Z wants more available free time instead a pay rise but Gen Z more available free time for themselves. Time that they can fill in themselves as they wish.

“The Netherlands has a record number of 9.4 million people in work. Half of them work part-time. And a third of them (about one and a half million people) don’t work more than twenty hours a week.” Source nu.nl

The employee increasingly wants to decide for himself how time and work is filled in. It is important that leaders understand that it should therefore be much more about the outcome of the work.  When and where the work is done becomes less and less relevant, it is more about meaningful interpretation of the work.

I too have always found it important

A long time ago I was allowed to attend a training. The training started with a word on the Whiteboard and we had to describe what association we had with it.

You can guess what my association was. The word on the board doesn’t matter. Sometimes you shouldn’t take things too seriously and have fun. Fortunately, the trainer picked it up well. Do you want to know what association I had? Mail me via info@careertracker.nl

The trainer then instructed the participants to write down what you have been most proud of in the past year. All my colleagues started writing passionately about something they were super proud of and then we had to present it.

The one beautiful new customer or order was presented and then I was allowed. There was 1 word in my presentation BALANS

All my colleagues laughed at me and the comment was not tender. Really something for you again, you don’t take it seriously etc.

The trainer went into the word BALANS because I took it seriously! “What do you mean by this”: the trainer asked.

What I mean by BALANS is the following:

Not much earlier I had become a father again and we moved so a lot happened in my life.

Fortunately, my results with the employer also remained fine so everything was well balanced.

Life is more than just the employer and the realization also slowly came to my colleagues.

Available professionals

As an employer, it is also important to be aware of this because due to the chronic staff shortage, there is increasing pressure on current employees. And yes, you can open the standard: “Under pressure everything becomes liquid” or “It can squeak and crack as long as it does not break”

This is a great starting point when changes can be expected in the short term with regard to the number of available professionals, but the market is currently under a lot of pressure so do you want to prevent unwanted departures and cancellations so is how much pressure do you want to put on your employees?

And that the market is under pressure, the figures of the UWV show again. The shortage on the labour market has risen so high that in the second quarter of 2022 there was a shortage of personnel in all professional groups. This is evident from the Spanningsindicator van UWV. 

Suppose we keep a shortage of available professionals do we continue to increase the pressure on current employees or is that path a risky one? Or should we strive for more happiness?

In addition, the labor market is subject to change anyway and I will discuss that further on this blog.